Exclusive Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later Poster Is Packed with 90s References

In 2015, Michael Showalter and David Wain did the impossible by doubling down on the improbable premise of the 2001 cult hit Wet Hot American Summer—which asked audiences to believe a cast of 20- and 30-something actors were teenage camp counselors—and asking Netflix viewers to swallow a prequel TV series, filmed 14 years later. Thanks to complete commitment from an all-star cast and the gonzo comedy of Wain and Showalter, the Netflix series, subtitled First Day of Camp, worked.

Now, almost the entire crew is back again for a follow-up that hops forward in time a decade to 1991 for a camp reunion titled Ten Years Later. This poster has your first look at all your returning favorites in one place, including Chris Pine’s rocker in a porkpie hat, Paul Rudd in full 90s drag as Matt Dillon in Singles, and, of course, H. Jon Benjamin’scharacter front and center.

There are some new faces joining both the cast and the poster for Ten Years Later. According to Wain, Samm Levine—who always provided the voice for young Arty, the camp D.J.—now gets to play the character in the flesh. Skyler Gisondo is Jeremy “Deegs” Deegenstein, a junior Camp Firewood counselor who “threatens Andy (Paul Rudd)’s status as ‘king of camp.’” Joey Bragg plays Deegs’s right-hand man, Seth. Wain also tells Vanity Fair:

We knew that for the “reunion” genre there needed to be the “super
couple”—so we decided to create two new characters and insert them
into the canon as if they’ve been there the whole time. For the man in
this couple, we always referred to him as the “Mark Feuerstein
character,” in fact naming him “Mark.” So when it came time for
casting, we thought, “no one can do Mark Feuerstein better than Mark
Feuerstein” . . . and it turned out to be true.

New cast member Sarah Burns, posing gamely beside Feuerstein in the poster, appears to complete the super couple. Marlo Thomas and Dax Shepard play members of a mysterious family that help Lindsay (Elizabeth Banks) find clues to a conspiracy she’s trying to unravel. Jai Courtney plays Garth MacArthur, an up-and-coming indie film actor who is working with—and sleeping with—Susie (Amy Poehler). Meanwhile, Poehler’s Parks and Recreation co-star, Adam Scott, plays another counselor who attends the reunion with his young daughter.

But when it comes to Renata, the mysterious nanny character played by Alyssa Milano, Wain and Showalter seem to differ. Both describe her as deceptively “sweet” and “cheery”—so, perhaps, we’re in for a Hand That Rocks the Cradle homage. (Milano’s crisp button-down in the poster supports this theory.) But while Wain says Milano is looking after “Adam Scott’s daughter,” Showalter describes Renata as “Ben and McKinley’s (Michael Ian Black) new nanny.” Ben was the name of Bradley Cooper’s character who married McKinley in the original 2001 film but Cooper is not slated to return to the new series. Meanwhile, Scott gives Black a very flirtatious look in the Ten Years Later trailer.

2015’s First Day of Camp seamlessly incorporated new characters played by the likes of Josh Charles,Kristen Wiig,Chris Pine, and Jason Schwartzman. According to Showalter, the latest additions to the camp are just as comfortable in the bizarre world of Wet Hot American Summer. “Even though they’re all new to the series,” he tells Vanity Fair, “it almost felt like they had been there all along from the beginning. They just fit in so well with everything and everyone.”

For the first two installments of Wet Hot American Summer, Wain and Showalter leaned heavily on their similar experiences as children at summer camps in the 80s. Ten Years Later is set partially at Camp Firewood and partially in New York City of the 90s and, according to Wain, both he and Showalter were able to once again draw on their shared background.

“I graduated NYU in 1991,” Wain recalls “and began a period where I spent my 20s in New York, among many friends I’d had since my teens (some from summer camp) all now trying to make their way in the world, all of trying to figure out who we were, how we fit in as ‘grownups’—and still trying to hook up.” Showalter adds: “A lot of us have been working together from when we were in our early 20s, so in many ways this is a reunion for us too. I think that comes through on screen. In terms of 90s nostalgia, who doesn’t have that?” All eight episodes of Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later will debut on Netflix on August 4.